


Burning Gold

by Azei



Series: The Found Family Universe [3]
Category: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Action/Adventure, Automail, BAMF Edward Elric, Being Lost, Domestic Fluff, Edward Elric Is A Little Shit, Edward Elric Swears, F/M, Family Dynamics, Family Feels, Fluff, Geniuses, Geographical Inaccuracies, Hohenheim's A+ Parenting, Humor, Kid Fic, Military, Mountains, Parental Riza Hawkeye, Parental Roy Mustang, Prodigies, Sort Of, Swearing, Team as Family, Teasing, Threats of Violence, Treasure Hunting
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-20
Updated: 2020-11-20
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:41:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27636308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Azei/pseuds/Azei
Summary: Ed wouldn't admit it, but he was tempted to just turn back and tell Mustang to fuck right off. It would serve him right, he thought, after all, sending your underage subordinate on a wild goose chase in the middle of the desert had to count as child abuse, right?Right.Riza and Maes would agree with him after all.
Relationships: Edward Elric & Jean Havoc, Edward Elric & Maes Hughes, Edward Elric & Riza Hawkeye, Edward Elric & Roy Mustang, Riza Hawkeye & Maes Hughes & Roy Mustang, Riza Hawkeye/Roy Mustang
Series: The Found Family Universe [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1885396
Comments: 4
Kudos: 46





	Burning Gold

**Author's Note:**

> I've been gone and I do apologize for that. You guys have voted for the Mountain of Gold mission that went a little crazy so here it is! I hope you like it!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ed is sent on a mission that he just doesn't have the brain power for at the moment. Understandably, he's more than a bit pissed off.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am back everybody! You guys wanted to see the Mountain of Gold mission that I mentioned in chapter 24 so here is the first chapter. It'll probably be able 2 maybe 3, chapters long so there is more to come soon!

* * *

Ed understood that without his alchemy he wouldn't be where he was now.

It was a part of him in ways he couldn't explain and the thought of living a life without it was... well it was a physically painful thought. So much so that he immediately threw it down a mental trash chute, doused it in a flammable propellant and gleefully set it aflame with an enthusiasm that would make Roy promptly order for another psych eval.

Which was almost equally as painful as it was stupid because, to be honest, he was a perfectly well-balanced individual of their nation- I mean look at the criminals he takes down and try to compare them!

You couldn't because Ed wasn't as crazy as them.

 **(He ignores the voice in his head telling him that he still referred to himself as crazy)** _._

If Ed could show just how much his life depended on alchemy, not just for survival mind you, but how it weaves itself into every part of his life from his friends to his family to his job- then maybe he would be able to explain it better. Alchemy was woven into every little thing in his life and some days, he just doesn't think Mustang or any of the others realize how much he needs it.

Alchemy was the one thing that Ed could just...do. He didn't have to work for it as Roy did for his flame alchemy, nor did he have to put effort into it as Al often had to. Alchemy came to him as easy as breathing. It was the one thing in life that he was good at without any prior knowledge. Ed knows that, on some level, the dependency he has with alchemy wouldn't be considered healthy.

Unfortunately, or fortunately, it was, in essence, a part of him.

Winry would often complain that he lived off of alchemy which, while completely unattainable, was not entirely untrue. As he lectured Winry on the stupidity of her statement- "I meant it in a literal way, Winry! I meant that it was impossible- **hey put that thing down!** " he yells as she throws her wrench at him for the fourth time that day. - the thought behind her statement continued to ring through his head.

While Granny rolled her eyes and yelled at them to pipe down and Al tried to placate their crazy gear head, Ed realized there was more truth behind her offhanded comment than any of them realized. 

Izumi was his teacher as much as she was his parent, that much was true, and while she taught Al and him a lot- she didn't _teach_ him alchemy. Van Hohenheim wasn't there to be a father much less an alchemy teacher. He didn't have a father to guide him nor a teacher to explain the basics. The books in the bastard's libraries offered theories that only exceptionally talented alchemists- that these alchemists were _adults_ is not exactly stated but most definitely implied. - could hope to understand.

It was never expected that a child, much less one who had never even heard of alchemy beforehand, would be able to learn from them.

But he had.

Ed took the meagre bits and scraps of information that the texts mentioned and he researched. He pieced them together until even the barest hint of an idea behind the theory was there. He learned to read between the lines and the half-mentioned references. It was like a gigantic puzzle laid before his eyes and only he knew the key behind it. It wasn't normal.

In fact, it made no sense that he was able to understand alchemy easily as he had. He shouldn't have been able to look at those textbooks and dumb it down enough that his baby brother could understand it. And he definitely should not have been able to teach Al the basics of alchemical theory and all the theories and treasures it had to offer.

Normal children are not capable of doing to do any of that.

But Ed had never exactly been a normal child, had he?

He knew that he was brighter than the other kids- most of the adults when he thinks about it. It wasn't hard to see that the Elric boys already knew everything before they even showed up for their first day of school. His mother had tried but by the time he was five she had given up trying to send her children to school. She had unenrolled them from the local school and was trying to get a professor from Central City University to help them test out of school before her death.

**(To be fair, she probably would have put up bigger of a fight if Granny wasn't already pulling Winry out.)**

When Mustang and Riza had shown up and offered a place in the military, they were surprised by his age but wrote it off due to his intelligence. Others would quickly follow suit- everyone from the guys at the office to random civilians and petty criminals he caught every week. It had become something of a running joke between Team Mustang.

At first, it was amusing but as time went on and the leaps between Al and him became more evident, the more he felt as if there was a wall between them. Don't get him wrong- Al was just as intelligent as Ed was, he wouldn't have been able to learn alchemy when Ed taught him otherwise, but Al didn't understand alchemy as easy as Ed did.

It didn't click for him as it did for Ed. Al would have to work to understand a theory that Ed could simply look at and break down its components and function. Even Ed sometimes forgot- he would get caught up in the moment and look at Al expectantly only to find him still pouring over a text trying to break it down. The differences in their ability to understand concepts began to push a slight divide between Ed and the person he was closest to.

There was a wall between Ed and the rest of the world.

He hated it.

The divide only reinforced the lack of understanding that others had when it came to just how much alchemy was woven into his everyday life. Although the others didn't quite understand how interconnected alchemy was in his life, they did understand the freakish abnormality that his understanding of alchemy was. 

This lack of understanding led Ed to his current predicament; on a train to the middle of nowhere going on some half-assed treasure scope about a local myth that may or may not be true.

It wasn't even that he was being sent out on such short notice that he didn't even have Al there to accompany him or that it may or may not even be true - 3/4 of the leads on the philosophers stone lead nowhere why would this be any different- no, it wasn't any of that.

You see, the thing about the higher-ups is that they only knew enough about alchemy to recognize a few key terms such as; alchemy, philosopher stone, transmutation circles, shiny lights, creation, deconstruction, philosopher of the East and West and of course the most well-known being Xerxes. 

**(Turns out anything that mentions gold or gems is something that gets most of their attention who would have thunk?)**

Which leads to why he's so pissed off about this whole thing- they hear one of those key terms and immediately send him everywhere after these leads as if he would discover something thought lost to modern society and let's just throw out an example here; a city of gold that disappeared in a night?

Needless to say, Ed was less than impressed.

* * *

"Hi-ya Chief!" came the cheerful voice of Jean Havoc.

Head pounding with the beginnings of a migraine, Ed glared as the older man waved at him from the train platform. Ed was a lot of things but naturally cheerful was not one of them. Al...sweet kind Al... he was cheerful. And as his cute baby brother, Ed would deal with said cheerfulness if only for the unconditional love and acceptance that he had for his brothers...sickeningly sweet disposition.

Anyone else was fair fucking game.

Especially happy-go-lucky coworkers who picked on him and distracted each other until threatened with their lives by Riza. His lips quirk up into a half-smile that he tries to force back down into a frown. He didn't want Havoc going back and telling Mustang- _that traitorous bastard his mind snarls_ \- that Ed was secretly happy to go out on last-minute, impromptu missions that he had no basis for going on but was chosen for because it was alchemy related.

Which, in the grand schemes of intelligence, made no fucking sense and if you tried to tell him he would get a degree in the philosophical theories of logic and ethics just to shove it so far up your ass you could feel it through your teeth. Unfortunately, for Ed that is, Havoc's ever-present smirk stretched out into a wide grin and Ed cursed himself for not being more careful.

He struts ( **he did not stomp!** ) over to the man, ignoring his grin, and snatches the train ticket from his outstretched hand. "Havoc- what the hell am I even doing here so early in the morning? I haven't even gotten to stop by the barracks and drop off my shit."

Havoc grimaced but under the fluorescent lights in the station, it came out looking like a frown. The older man rubbed the back of his head before lighting up another cigarette, "Sorry about that Chief, but Mustang just thought it would be easier if you simply did a back to back train stop. Higher-ups and all want this done quickly- they don't know what you'll find but Grumman seems pretty antsy if you ask me."

Ed grumbled as he threw a smaller suitcase at the man, "When isn't he antsy? Fucker acts as if he has a lacy black thong riding up his ass. Better yet, there might as well be a 10-inch stick up there- it would explain the unnatural posture that even Mustang doesn't have."

"I thought you and the old man were cool?" Havoc questioned as he caught the case with a grunt.

"Oh we are- just not when he approved an order to send me across the country on back to back missions at four in the fucking morning. Speaking of, how the hell did the Colonel Bastard convince you to even come here at the crack ass of dawn?"Ed said spitefully as he redid his braid.

Havoc grinned sheepishly," Promised me a pack of smokes."

"Ah, bribery, a tale as old as time. Just don't let Riza catch you, you crazy bastard. She can sniff those things out easily enough." Shoulders slumped, Ed turned with the ticket as he prepared to catch his next train.

"Will do, Chief!"

Ed answers him with a middle finger as he strolls away from the older man. It was too early for anyone to be happy and if they tried, he would take it as a personal offence. From behind him, Havoc gives a booming chuckle and a vein in his forehead throbs at the sound as his headache steadily gets stronger.

"Have fun on your trip!" 

"Shut the fuck up, Havoc!"

* * *

Ed did not arrive on schedule.

In fact, because of a railway block due to a herd of cows and then a delay on his next layover between stations, he didn't arrive in the back-ass water town of Cameron until well after midnight. The only people to see him arrive were a couple of drunks in the corner of the station and the conductor who looks like he could drop dead at any moment and really- how did retirement funds get so bad that the 80-year-old with a heart condition was a better choice than paying for his retirement plan?

He feels an eye twitch as he stares out at the dustball of a town- if it could even be called that- and in the distance a crow echos out an eerie warning through the air.

He then zeros in on the phone booth as little awhile away as his eyes shift to the shady fuckers eyeing him from the corner of the station. He knew that look well enough to know what they were thinking. They see a kid, **fuck you very much** , and immediately think it's an easy cash night. Ed has faced more than his share of petty crooks and out-right assholes looking to make a quick buck but for once in his life, Ed thinks, _'I'm not getting paid enough for this'._

This is a bewildering thought, even for him, because he gets paid, as a State Alchemist, more money than a regular major would. Combined with the fact that Ed only uses his money for research, travel and automail- he doesn't touch any of it. When out on missions, the government pays for board, food and travel fare. And he either lives in the barracks in Central or back home in a spare bedroom Granny set aside for them.

**(Although he doesn't know this at the time, Ed is paid more handsomely than he thinks. However, due to the damage rates on most, if not all, of his missions, the military has had to deduct his check to help support the monthly costs. In all his time in the military, there was only one mission where Ed was not to be blamed for the damages and thus, did not get a deduction on his pay. Riza still has the pictures of Roy crying tears of joy as he signs Ed's paycheck with a flourish. They frame it and hang it above a mantlepiece in Roy's home. Roy will sometimes pass by it and smiled fondly at the photograph.)**

So no, Ed is not strapped for cash as much as he makes Winry think every time she bleeds him dry of his money.

But at that moment, in that single moment of absolute clarity **(liar)** and sleep deprivation **(that's more like it)** , Ed was more than tempted to just turn back and tell Mustang to fuck right off. It would serve him right, he thought, after all, sending your underage subordinate on a wild goose chase in the middle of the desert had to count as child abuse, right?

Right.

Riza and Maes would agree with him after all.

Unfortunately, doing so would probably count as insubordination and he would get penalized. Contrary to popular belief, Ed wasn't getting a mark against his record every other fucking week. It has less to do with his attitude and more to do with his superior. Mustang can put up with a lot of his bullshit and part of him wonders if it's because Mustang doesn't think it's worth it to have his rising meal ticket get thrown out before he can show his worth or if Mustang can't actually be bothered to write up the paperwork.

As he thinks on it more, the latter sounds more plausible. Ed's pretty sure the paperwork for a penalty form alone is like twenty pages, forget the specialized forms needed for state alchemists and then the ones of Ed alone since technically, as Al is underage, Mustang is listed as next of kin right up there at the top of the list next to Izumi and Granny.

Which means that he'd need to get another superior of his to even sign off on a form to give him another form to get another form to sign the penalizations forms for Ed blowing shit up and being "a little asshole" in Mustang's words...yeah you could see why he wouldn't bother going through the trouble unless Ed really pissed him off about something.

( **Turns out, it's a lot harder to do than he thought. It's almost been 3 years with the fucker and he hasn't even raised his voice. He's almost suspicious. Al claims that it's a bad thing if he wants Roy to yell at him but Ed had waved him off. After all, Teacher yelled at them when they fucked shit up- so why wasn't the Colonel Bastard?** )

Rubbing his eyes, Ed turns to the conductor to asks for instructions to the nearest hotel and hopes to god that the drunks looking for quick cash don't get any funny ideas. He'd like to at least make it through more than four hours before Mustang gives him another call about public damages and hurting civilians which is bullshit in his eyes because obviously the fuckers don't care that Ed is a kid so why should he care that they're civilians?

It's backwards logic if you ask Ed.

But it was also a problem for another day as he rubbed his blurry eyes and made his way in the direction the conductor pointed out to him. He needed to get sleep and then he could deal with the bullshit when he wasn't losing brain cells trying to comprehend the idiocy of the human race.

But first, he had a call to make.

It only took a few minutes to reach the phone booth and ring up Central Command. He knows Mustang isn't going home anytime soon- partly because of the paperwork and partly because he always waits for Ed to check in before leaving the office. Something about feeling morally obligated but Ed wasn't paying attention due to the odd feeling of warmth in his chest that he hadn't felt since before his mother died at the man's words.

After a few rings, a tired voice comes through the other end of the line," Colonel Mustang speaking, how ma-"

"You're a real piece of fucking work, you know that Colonel Bastard! Why the hell am I even out here?" he shouts inside the booth, ignoring the concerned looks he's getting from the old man and drunks.

"Hello to you too Fullmetal. I trust you reached Cameron safely?" Mustang chuckles out.

Ed hisses, "Don't ignore me-why am I out here? Couldn't they have sent Alex? I have better shit to do than go on some goose chase because Grumman is trying to win favour with those pansy asses up in Central."

A sigh is heard, "As much as it pains me to say-"

"Fucking liar."

"-, my hands are tied. This came from the higher-ups, I had no say."

"Then why the hell do you sound so fucking smug about it? Admit it, you want me to check this lead out just as much as those over fuckers do! You didn't even need to send me- you could have sent anybody to do this job!" Ed seethes.

He can practically hear the eye-roll from over the phone," Would it make you feel better if I did?"

Ed would deny it to his dying day because he didn't fucking pout,"...yes."

"Then yes, I will admit that I am not as broken up about this mission as you are-"

"Don't put words in my mouth, you bastard!"

Mustang's voice came out softer this time, "- Regardless Edward, I am sorry that I had to send you away from Alphonse again." 

"...fine, I forgive you, you bastard."

A warm chuckle is heard over the line and Ed smiles for a moment, soft and warm, before it drops and becomes down-right predatory," I'm still telling Riza."

There's a thump over the phone as if Roy had dropped something before he's shouting, "No! Don't you dare tell her-"

_Click_

Ed hung up the phone with a smug smile on his face. He leaves the booth, suitcase slung nonchalantly over his shoulder and his other hand in his pocket. He whistles an eerie tune as he walks down the dirt road towards the hotel. Tomorrow the mission would start and he'd be sent on a wild fucking goose chase in order to appease the egos of the higher-ups, but tonight?

Tonight, Ed will relish in the fact that the Colonel Bastard will be so worried about him telling Riza that he won't get any of his paperwork done. This will inevitably piss her off even more after Ed calls her first thing in the morning to tell her what Mustang did. A sharp cackle leaves his throat at the thought of pure terror on that bastard's face and nearby one of the drunks falls from his seat at the sound.

Sometimes, it was good to be someone that everyone would underestimate.

Now, all he had to do was investigate in this bullshit Xerxes mountain, declare it a false lead and head back home. 

The easiest job he's had all year.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you guys liked it!


End file.
